July 14, 2017 — the date when the history of the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange began. Over 9 years, Binance has gone from a startup to a financial empire, and today we break down the key milestones of this journey.
From "Binary Finance" to Global Dominance
The name Binance is an abbreviation of Binary Finance, which emphasized the project's original technological focus. The platform was created exclusively for cryptocurrency pairs, without fiat support. Within six months of its launch, in January 2018, Binance became the global leader in daily trading volume. At its peak in the fall of 2022, its share of the spot market reached 62%.
The Founder's Journey: From McDonald's to Billionaire
The story of Changpeng Zhao (CZ) is a classic rags-to-riches success story. The future founder worked at McDonald's and a gas station in his youth to help his family. Later, he developed order matching systems for the Tokyo Stock Exchange and futures trading software at Bloomberg. In 2014, Zhao made a radical decision: he sold his apartment in Shanghai for $900,000 and invested all the proceeds in Bitcoin at an average price of around $600. This move became the foundation of his future fortune.
China's Ban and a Nomadic Lifestyle
Just two months after its launch, in September 2017, China banned ICOs and cryptocurrency exchanges. The Binance team had to urgently evacuate servers and personnel. Since then, the company did not disclose the location of its headquarters for many years, and CZ lived the life of a "digital nomad." Today, according to Forbes, the private company's base is in the UAE, where the founder resides.
A Meme Turned Insurance: The Story of SAFU
The phrase "Funds are safe," which CZ constantly repeated to users, turned into a meme in 2018. Binance turned the joke into a real financial product — the Secure Asset Fund for Users (SAFU). The fund is replenished with 10% of all trading fees. By January 2022, its volume reached $1 billion, and in 2026, the assets were converted from stablecoins to BTC. SAFU fully covered user losses after a hacker attack in May 2019, when over 7,000 BTC worth more than $40 million were withdrawn from the exchange.
Record Fine and Pardon
In 2023, Binance admitted to violating U.S. sanctions, laundering about $898 million through over 1.5 million illegal transactions. The fine of $4.3 billion became one of the largest in U.S. history. CZ paid a personal fine of $50 million and spent four months in prison. In October 2025, he received a pardon from U.S. President Donald Trump.
Evolution: From Crypto Exchange to Financial Supermarket
Today, Binance is not just a platform for trading cryptocurrencies. In 2025, the platform added trading of over 7,000 U.S. stocks and ETFs, including tokenized bStocks securities. The volume of such assets under management exceeded $1 billion within the first month. The company is moving towards a "one-stop shop" model for all finances, targeting an audience of 3 billion people.
My analysis: 9 years of Binance is not just the success story of one company, but a mirror of the entire crypto industry. From radical decentralization to forced compromise with regulators, from a meme to an insurance fund. Binance has proven it can adapt to any conditions, but the main question remains open: can it maintain its leadership in an era of increasingly strict regulation and the emergence of new decentralized competitors?